黄海涛 | 新州初选折射美国政治“新形态” |

Editor's note

Zhao Quansheng [Overseas See the World] Editor-in-Chief:

The U.S. presidential election, which will be held in November this year, will be watched by the world. The just-concluded Republican and Democratic primaries all point in one direction: Trump, whom many cannot (or are unwilling to believe) can not (or won't believe), has returned. Biden fighting Trump again has become a prospect with a high probability. For this pivotal election, [Overseas See the World] will pay close attention to it highly and continuously. This time, we invited 16 scholars from the United States, Chinese mainland and Japan to give a quick review of the Trump phenomenon and the US election.

(Written on January 26, 2024)

Scholars and their affiliations participating in this quick review:

Qingshan Tan, Cleveland State University, USA

Wang Zaibang Taihe Think Tank

Zhong Yang, University of Tennessee, USA

Geng Xin, Shenzhen Radio and Television Group

Tao Xie, Beijing University of Foreign Chinese

Hongwei Zhao, Hosei University, Japan

Taiyi Sun, Christopher Newport University, USA

Dingli Shen, Fudan University

Allegheny College, USA

Haitao Huang, Nankai University

Liu Weidong, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

Wang Hao, Fudan University

Haimo Li, Fudan University

Shuying Chen, University of Washington (Seattle)

Dayun Xiong, Yamanashi Gakuin University, Japan

Wu Xinbo, Shanghai Wai Chinese University

Huang Haitao

Associate Professor, Department of International Relations, Zhou Enlai School of Government, Nankai University

16 Scholars' Commentary [Biden Fights Trump Again?] Part 10

NSW primaries reflect the 'new shape' of US politics

Nikki Haley's defeat in the New Hampshire primary marks the end of the Republican presidential race. Haley's 11-point loss to Trump in New Hampshire, a traditional blue state, suggests that even if she returns to her hometown of South Carolina, she will struggle to garner more votes from a more conservative electorate than her opponents. While the Haley campaign has vowed to stay the course and win primaries in the next dozen states, the Republican National Committee has proposed to designate Trump as its candidate so that it can focus its resources on competing with the Democrats in advance. Whether the proposal passes or not, Haley will have to contend with the embarrassment of dissipating support within the party. In the mainstream media in the United States, there is an endless stream of analyses of the results of the NSW primaries. One widely disseminated view is that, in addition to the fact that Haley and DeSantis focused on attacking each other in the early stage, Trump once again reaped the benefits of the fisherman, as they did in 2016, the more fundamental reason is that the influence of the moderate and traditional Republican elite represented by Haley is rapidly shrinking, and the "anti-Trump coalition" that it struggles to maintain is less cohesive and combative than Trump's loyal supporters. Haley sees herself as inspiring generational change, uniting voters across the spectrum, and bringing American politics back to "normal." As everyone knows, the "normal" of the American political ecology has changed.

A combination of exit polls from various pollsters shows that the people who voted for Trump in the NSW primaries are more evenly distributed among all age groups, and there are no substantial gender-based differences. Compared with voters who voted for Haley, Trump supporters are more religious, with a majority of low- and moderate-income whites, have a lower opinion of the country's current economic situation and future trends, are more concerned about immigration and economic issues, and strongly support candidates who are perceived to share values and can speak for and fight for themselves. The data suggests that Trump's fundamentals do not appear to have changed much – those with relatively low levels of education, who see their economic status as declining, and who are dissatisfied with immigration and multiculturalism eroding religious traditional values, make up Trump's staunch and staunch supporters. And the traditional establishment, which cares about U.S. foreign policy, about how much the government is going to cut taxes, about free trade, and about the market economy, is making it seriously less attractive to most Republican voters.

People participate in a protest in New York, U.S., on May 6, 2023 (Photo source: Xinhuanet)

In the view of the increasingly polarized Republican right, struggle, not compromise may be the key to solving all current problems in the United States, and Haley's advocacy of "uniting all factions and returning to normal" is tantamount to capitulating to the "enemy" of the Democratic Party. If the norm in contemporary American politics from Ronald Reagan to Obama's presidency has been to seek some balance or common divisor between liberals and conservatives, then since the election of Donald Trump as president in 2016, we can see that political polarization and polarization have shaped a political "new form" that competes with the "normal" of the past. Haley's defeat in NSW not only shows the technical factors of the election campaign that are worth reviewing, but more importantly, it allows more and more politicians who are not limited to conservatives to once again appreciate the powerful potential of the "new form". Whether the future will follow the trend, guide the situation or go against the trend may not be difficult for politicians who prioritize votes.

On January 23, Eastern time, former U.S. President Donald Trump won the New Hampshire Republican primary. His current only opponent in the party, Nikki Haley, a former permanent representative to the United Nations, has refused to withdraw. (Image source: Internet)

Of course, the NSW primaries are not all bad news for Democrats. On the one hand, a sizable portion of pro-Haley voters identify as Democrats, while Trump's pro-Trump crowd is not entirely unconcerned about the issue of judicial proceedings. As a result, Trump's advantage in NSW is far less than his record in the 2016 primary, and it is likely that he will not be able to win this battleground state in future elections. Trump's victory will also have a certain counter-stimulus to Democratic supporters, forcing them to come out and vote. However, opposing Trump is not the same as supporting Biden. An interesting phenomenon is that although the current strong performance of the US economy is much better than that of most developed countries in the world, and the Biden team is taking advantage of this to increase propaganda, the Gallup survey shows that about two-thirds of respondents disapprove of Biden's economic recovery plan, while the Economist survey shows that about half of the respondents believe that the economic situation is deteriorating. The excessive pessimism of the public on economic issues will inevitably dissipate the Biden team's efforts to promote positive propaganda to a certain extent. The trend of decoupling overall economic performance from individual intuitive feelings will also further accelerate the development of the political "new situation".

This article was exclusively published by the Overseas View World platform, and the text only represents the author's point of view.